Water polo coach puts value in values

This was what he had always wanted, to coach the men’s U.S. Olympic water polo team, but when the opportunity arose, Terry Schroeder wasn’t sure the timing was right.

This was 13 months ago. Coach Ricardo Azevedo had been fired three weeks before an Olympic qualifying tournament for reasons USA Water Polo won’t discuss, and the team was in turmoil.

Schroeder, an assistant coach for a year, was happy in a part-time role that allowed him to share his chiropractic practice in Westlake Village with his wife, Lori, and be an attentive daddy to their two daughters.

His family needed him -- but so did the national team, which finished seventh at the Athens Olympics, dropped to 11th in the world in 2005 and lost its funding from the U.S. Olympic Committee while going through three coaches in 2 1/2 years.

After getting his wife’s blessing, he agreed to take the job.

“Just to try to keep everybody calm and focused and stabilize the program at that point,” he said. “After being with them a couple times, I knew in my heart that it was the right thing to do and I felt like I could help them.”

Schroeder, who modeled for the Coliseum statue that symbolizes the ideal male athlete, has done the near-impossible, restoring the competitiveness and confidence the team has lacked since he was a four-time Olympian and won silver medals in 1984 and 1988.

With Schroeder reinforcing fundamentals and introducing new defensive strategies, the U.S. men finished a best-ever second to powerful Serbia last month in the championship of the FINA men’s world league super final. This year they beat Croatia, Montenegro and Australia and lost to Hungary by one goal as the visiting team, significant signs of a renaissance.

“Part of who I am was really looking at this team and saying, ‘Can we win a medal?’ before I even took the job,” said Schroeder, a Santa Barbara native who played and coached at Pepperdine.

“I didn’t want to go in there and get sixth or seventh place. That’s the last thing I want to do.

“It’s been 20 years since they won a medal. So I really felt from the beginning that we could get back to the podium. In fact, when I came on as an assistant coach that was something I said in my first meeting, I said, ‘I’m here because I want to help you guys get back to the podium.’”

The runner-up finish in the world league super final -- the U.S. trailed, 4-3, after three quarters -- made him adjust his sights upward. So too did a recent team-building trip to Colorado, where players and coaches hiked, slept in tepees and solidified their trust in one another.

“I think that mantra of being back on the podium has changed to, ‘Let’s win a gold medal,’ ” said Schroeder, 48. “The USA hasn’t won a gold medal in water polo since 1904. Let’s change the history here. Let’s win a gold medal.”

It’s still a longshot. The U.S. is ranked ninth in the world.

But Schroeder has taken the abundant talent produced in this country -- much of it in Southern California -- and proved the U.S. can play with the world’s top teams.

Christopher Ramsey, chief executive of USA Water Polo since November 2006, played the sport and admired Schroeder. “One of those heroes that you have out there, somebody who really builds something,” Ramsey said.

Once he began to oversee the men’s and women’s programs and got to know Schroeder better, he discovered Schroeder was still focused on winning while maintaining a strong set of values.

“I think that he has brought a tremendous stability and a certain sense of honor to the team and to the players, which comes from his own sense of the honor of being able to play for your country,” Ramsey said.

Honor? Teamwork? In a me-first, I wanna be a “SportsCenter” highlight world?

Ramsey’s theory is that water polo, though a major professional sport in Europe, is played here more out of passion than a desire to get rich. That makes it a throwback of sorts and makes players more receptive to the “old-fashioned” values Schroeder is keeping alive.

“I think that Terry has tapped into something very deep,” Ramsey said, “because of the commitment that all of these players have to the game itself and to using the game as a way to test themselves, their abilities and their own character.”

Schroeder’s commitment has come at a price. His youngest daughter, 6-year-old Sheridan, clings to him when he comes home and begged to go with him to Colorado.

“It’s tough to leave them behind,” he said, “but Lori and the girls are going to go to China. They’re excited about that. That’s kind of their reward for being part of this and supporting me in it. They’ll get a chance to experience the Olympic Games firsthand too.”

And to see some of the most admirable Olympic ideals preserved and promoted by a man who’s still a model, after all these years.

--

Helene Elliott can be reached at helene.elliott@ latimes.com.

To read previous columns by Elliott, go to latimes.com/elliott.

--

BEIJING 2008

Countdown to the Summer Olympics: 26 days

--

ON THE WEB To see video of Coach Terry Schroeder in action, go to latimes.com/sports/olympics .